CHAPTER 15
When Mel Glass announced that it was time to move on Robles, the team of detectives sprang into action. They’d kept the suspect under surveillance, including using a fake yellow taxicab from which to follow his movements on the streets. Therefore, Detective Marty Zinkand knew where to find Robles as he stood on the corner of East Eighty-ninth Street and Third Avenue. The big detective pounced on Robles before the suspect realized he was a cop.
“What’s this about?” Robles demanded as the detective placed the handcuffs over his thin wrists.
“You’re under arrest,” Zinkand snarled, “for the murders of Janice Wylie and Emily Hoffert.”
As Robles pleaded his innocence, the fake cab drove up. Zinkand hauled his “collar” over to the curb and pushed him down into the backseat. Like a regular cop car, the taxi had no handles allowing escape. The car proceeded to the northeast corner of Ninety-third Street and Third Avenue, where Lieutenant Cavanaugh and Sergeant William Brent entered the vehicle.
Instead of taking Robles straight to the Twenty-third Precinct, they removed the handcuffs and drove around for about an hour questioning the suspect, who denied being involved in the Wylie-Hoffert murders. At one point Cavanaugh told Robles, “This is D-day.”
Robles then reached into his pocket and pulled out a business card for attorney Mack Dollinger. “I want to speak to my lawyer,” he said.
The investigators ignored his request and instead drove him over to the Delaneys’ second-floor apartment on 330 East Eighty-fourth Street. The couple was home and met the detectives and Robles at the door. Suddenly realizing why he’d been brought to the apartment, Robles again demanded to see a lawyer.
Jimmy Delaney rushed up to Robles. Before the police could move, Delaney jabbed his index finger into the suspect’s chest. “Fuck a lawyer, Ricky! Everything you’ve said here has been recorded! We’ve been working with the DA’s office and the cops. They know everything! They’ve heard your voice! Your only chance not to fry in Sing Sing is to tell the truth and cooperate.”
Blinking in shock, Robles stared at Jimmy Delaney—his supplier, fellow addict and friend. But there was no pity there.
“He’s right, girl killer,” Margie sneered. “We’ve been cooperating. The apartment is bugged and taped. So much for us being the liars.”
If Robles needed any more convincing, Cavanaugh led him over to the closet and showed him the microphone. “We’ve recorded everything you’ve said in here for the past three months,” the lieutenant informed him. “Now, why don’t you make this easier on yourself and talk to us about killing those girls.”
Robles’s face turned white and he burst into tears. “I’m sorry I’m not dead,” he cried. “I tried to kill myself. Jail is a horrible place, where you just rot. I need a shot, Jimmy, and then I’ll talk. . . .” But then his voice trailed off, and he refused to say anything more without his lawyer.
For three hours the detectives questioned Robles at the Delaney apartment. But although he would bend—while alternating between asking to see a lawyer and pleading for a shot of heroin—he wouldn’t break and confess outright. Finally Lieutenant Cavanaugh decided it was time to take him to the Twenty-third Precinct headquarters to be booked.
About the same time as the suspect and his captors left the Delaney apartment, Glass drove away from the Criminal Courts Building and headed uptown to the Twenty-third Precinct, too. When he arrived, he moved past the press, who’d heard rumors of an arrest in Wylie-Hoffert. He made his way to the detective squad room on the second floor, where Robles was being held in a detention cage.
Detective Zinkand walked over to brief him on what had happened at the Delaney apartment. The detective had just finished, when another officer approached. Looking at Glass, he hooked a thumb behind his back at Robles. “He wants to see you alone.”
Glass excused himself from Zinkand and walked over to the detention cage. “I understand you asked to talk to me?”
“Yeah,” Robles replied. He hesitated a moment, licking his thin blue lips, and scratching incessantly at his arms. When he looked up at Glass, the suspect’s eyes were frightened, pleading. “What can you do for me?” he asked.
Glass didn’t answer right away. He stood for a moment reminding himself that this scared, drug-addicted young man was also a vicious murderer. Then Glass spoke: “It’s not what I can do for you, Ricky. It’s what you can do for yourself. You have obviously been living with this for a long time, so you might as well get it off your chest. Make a clean breast of things.”
“What about psychiatric help?”
Glass shrugged. “Right now, it is a black-and-white situation. The cops say you did it, and you say you didn’t do it. We have nothing to base psychiatric help on. Maybe if you give a full statement for the court, it can be presented to a judge and a psychiatrist to analyze and determine if you need psychiatric help.”
Robles sat still, except for his rapidly blinking eyes. So Glass pushed a little harder. “It appears you panicked in the apartment.”
“It wasn’t panic. Something went wrong.”
“Do you want to tell me about it?” asked Glass, much more nonchalantly than he felt.
Robles started to say something, but then he closed his mouth. Suddenly Mack Dollinger hurried into the squad room. The suspect nodded toward him. “I want to speak to my lawyer first.”
Glass glanced over his shoulder at the defense attorney. “I’ll go get him,” he said.
Detective David Downes arrived at the Twenty-third Precinct about the same time after receiving a call from Mel Glass, who’d let him know about the arrest. He’d hurried out of his house in Yonkers and drove into Manhattan. Reaching the Two-Three—which was abuzz with news about the Robles bust, with brass hurrying every which way—he quietly made his way to the detective squad room on the second floor. He spotted Glass standing with Dollinger, a tall, handsome Clark Kent type. Downes walked over.
Glass looked at him and asked him to take Robles over to the clerical office so that the defendant could speak to his lawyer, Dollinger. The defense attorney remained in the office with Robles for about a half hour and then emerged. “Detective, would you mind staying with him while I go talk to Mel?”
Downes watched as Dollinger and Glass engaged in an animated conversation, and then Downes walked into the office where Robles sat. The suspect looked terrible. His eyes were feverish and haunted; his face and trembling hands were a sickly pallor. He scratched at his arms as though every inch itched. The detective thought about the first time he’d seen him in 1960—a nice-looking sixteen-year-old, but already a drug addict and career criminal.
“How ya doin’, Ricky?” Downes asked.
Robles grimaced. “I need a fix,” he said. “The last time I shot up was two in the morning. I’m jonesing for a hit, man.”
Ignoring the comment, Downes shook his head. “Boy, Ricky, did you ever think it would end up like this? You’re twenty-one years old and you’ve made a real mess of your life. What really happened?”
Robles dropped his head and then began to nod. He looked up with tears welling in his eyes. “I don’t know, Downes. I went to pull a lousy burglary and I wound up killing two girls.”